Top Load Media Cabinet - Black

Just received this and put it together that same day. It took about 6 hours to put together, but I took lots of breaks. This is a very heavy unit and it was a lot taller than I thought it would be, it is over 3 feet tall. It has loads of storage and seems to be very useful. Not too sure I like the top load though, because I was planning on putting a lamp on top and now I can't because it opens from the top, but I guess that means less clutter also. I think this is a really nice piece and others are really interested in getting this same piece for their houses. Not enough glue was included in this set and I used the wrong glue for the wrong pieces, but it wasn't a problem. I recommend getting some extra crazy glue to finish up this piece.

This media cabinet wasn’t just annoying to assemble, it was an outright nightmare, easily the most infuriating, poorly thought‑out piece of furniture I’ve ever had the misfortune of dealing with. For the price they’re charging, the assembly should be straightforward, but instead the instructions read like they were slapped together in five minutes by someone who’s never seen the product. Run‑on sentences, half‑formed thoughts, entire steps missing... I found myself rereading the booklet over and over, convinced I had to be the one missing something. I even had someone else read the directions aloud just to sanity‑check me, and she couldn’t find a single mistake on my end. The truth is simple: the instructions themselves are incomplete. And as if the atrocious directions weren’t enough, the workmanship is just as infuriating. Holes are drilled in the wrong places, others are missing entirely, and several of the screws and hardware pieces simply weren’t included. Shelving holes? Missing. Door hardware? Missing. Basic quality control? Apparently nonexistent. For what this thing costs, this level of sloppiness is absolutely unacceptable. The only reason we didn’t demand a refund is because we’re handy enough and equipped enough to fix the manufacturer’s mistakes ourselves. We essentially had to finish building the product for them. Then there’s the insult on top of all this: they offer a $100 “assembly service.” Honestly, that feels like a cash grab designed to cover for their own terrible instructions. If the manual were written clearly and the product were manufactured correctly, no one would need to pay extra just to make the thing usable. At this point, though, I’d tell anyone considering this cabinet to stay far away from this product and this company. If you decide to pay the extra fee it'll be purely to avoid losing five or more hours of your life fighting with it. Please avoid like the plague.

The main issues with this for me are the instructions being outdated. Mine came with a piece put together and with additional instructions to ignore certain instructions. And some of the images are outright mirrored to what you actually do (so it will show something on the left when it's on the right, for example and there's no way you're wrong because it couldn't go the other way at all). And it's just really confusing at times since it has you do a ton of things per step and while it's clear with some things (pointing out to make sure the surfaced side is facing out, things like that) it's really bad with other things. But my main issue with the product itself is the issue a lot have with the door shelves. The bars have a bend on the part that rests against the sides of the shelves which causes less wiggle room and more snug fits which with irregular sized DVD cases can easily fling the bar across the room unless you switch it to the CD size. I don't see why it isn't attached on the outside in some way instead and secured on the inside with a washer or something. The other problem is the screws you use to screw them into the doors. This also reduces the size use available where the screws are which causes the same above issue. Combined with the bent bars that makes it easier for them to pop right out. I don't know I'm hardly some engineer, or whoever designs such things, but there's got to be a better way to handle them. Overall I'm happy with this, it looks nice although be careful or you'll scratch the crap out of it like I accidentally did just scooting one of the doors across my floor a few inches while I was screwing on some of the shelves... I got the black one, so can't speak to the stained ones those looked ugly from the product images and the user pictures for me. It's so close to perfect for what it is intended to be. It fits a ton of cases. Oh, but the magnets for the doors is kinda crappy. Frankly it feels like mine are broken as the little... idk, magnet strips? move around a lot and I can't recall any other doors on anything I've ever seen do that so easily. Oh and the magnets you put on the doors have these little bumps on them and I couldn't figure out if you put the bumps toward the other magnet or the door, but if you put it against the door it looked like it would move around so that seemed wrong but who knows.